50
Used, New, and Out of Print Books - We Buy and Sell - Powell's Books
Cart |
|  my account  |  wish list  |  help   |  800-878-7323
Hello, | Login
MENU
  • Browse
    • New Arrivals
    • Bestsellers
    • Featured Preorders
    • Award Winners
    • Audio Books
    • See All Subjects
  • Used
  • Staff Picks
    • Staff Picks
    • Picks of the Month
    • Bookseller Displays
    • 50 Books for 50 Years
    • 25 Best 21st Century Sci-Fi & Fantasy
    • 25 PNW Books to Read Before You Die
    • 25 Books From the 21st Century
    • 25 Memoirs to Read Before You Die
    • 25 Global Books to Read Before You Die
    • 25 Women to Read Before You Die
    • 25 Books to Read Before You Die
  • Gifts
    • Gift Cards & eGift Cards
    • Powell's Souvenirs
    • Journals and Notebooks
    • socks
    • Games
  • Sell Books
  • Blog
  • Events
  • Find A Store

Don't Miss

  • Powell's Picks of the Season
  • The Best Books of 2023
  • Powell's Author Events
  • Oregon Battle of the Books
  • Audio Books

Visit Our Stores


Michelle Carroll: Neck the Halls: 19 Holiday Romances, Both Naughty and Spice (0 comment)
Every December, when the Portland sun disappears, my mental health depends on a steady stream of sugary-sweet holiday rom-coms. While I love the low-budget movies (unlicensed new pop songs with auto-tuned jingle bells! Every scene obviously filmed in the same McMansion, even the ones that take place at "work"! Chemistry...
Read More»
  • Kelsey Ford: Twelve Days of Horror (0 comment)
  • Keith Mosman: Best Books of 2023: Audiobooks (0 comment)

{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##

Childrens Blizzard

by David Laskin
Childrens Blizzard

  • Comment on this title
  • Synopses & Reviews

ISBN13: 9780060520762
ISBN10: 0060520760
Condition: Standard


All Product Details

View Larger ImageView Larger Images
Ships free on qualified orders.
Add to Cart
$7.95
List Price:$16.99
Used Trade Paperback
Ships in 1 to 3 days
Add to Wishlist
QtyStore
1Burnside
1Cedar Hills

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments

The gripping story of an epic prairie snowstorm that killed hundreds of newly arrived settlers and cast a shadow on the promise of the American frontier.

January 12, 1888, began as an unseasonably warm morning across Nebraska, the Dakotas, and Minnesota, the weather so mild that children walked to school without coats and gloves. But that afternoon, without warning, the atmosphere suddenly, violently changed. One moment the air was calm; the next the sky exploded in a raging chaos of horizontal snow and hurricane-force winds. Temperatures plunged as an unprecedented cold front ripped through the center of the continent.

By Friday morning, January 13, some five hundred people lay dead on the drifted prairie, many of them children who had perished on their way home from country schools. In a few terrifying hours, the hopes of the pioneers had been blasted by the bitter realities of their harsh environment. Recent immigrants from Germany, Norway, Denmark, and the Ukraine learned that their free homestead was not a paradise but a hard, unforgiving place governed by natural forces they neither understood nor controlled.

With the storm as its dramatic, heartbreaking focal point, The Children's Blizzard captures this pivotal moment in American history by tracing the stories of five families who were forever changed that day. Drawing on family interviews and memoirs, as well as hundreds of contemporary accounts, David Laskin creates an intimate picture of the men, women, and children who made choices they would regret as long as they lived. Here too is a meticulous account of the evolution of the storm and the vain struggle of government forecasters to track its progress.

The blizzard of January 12, 1888, is still remembered on the prairie. Children fled that day while their teachers screamed into the relentless roar. Husbands staggered into the blinding wind in search of wives. Fathers collapsed while trying to drag their children to safety. In telling the story of this meteorological catastrophe, the deadliest blizzard ever to hit the prairie states, David Laskin has produced a masterful portrait of a tragic crucible in the settlement of the American heartland.

Review

"Laskin captures the brutal, heartbreaking folly of this chapter in America's history." Erik Larson, author of Isaac's Storm and The Devil in the White City

Review

"[A]n engrossing if speculative account of a brutal 1888 blizzard that signaled the end of optimism on the Great Plains....A suspenseful disaster narrative." Kirkus Reviews

Synopsis

"David Laskin deploys historical fact of the finest grain to tell the story of a monstrous blizzard that caught the settlers of the Great Plains utterly by surprise. Using the storm as a lens, Laskin captures the brutal, heartbreaking folly of this chapter in America's history, and along the way delves into the freakish physics of extreme cold. This is a book best read with a fire roaring in the hearth and a blanket and box of tissues near at hand." -- Erik Larson, author of The Devil in the White City

Thousands of impoverished Northern European immigrants were promised that the prairie offered "land, freedom, and hope." The disastrous blizzard of 1888 revealed that their free homestead was not a paradise but a hard, unforgiving place governed by natural forces they neither understood nor controlled, and America's heartland would never be the same.

This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.

Synopsis

On the afternoon of January 12, 1888, a devastating blizzard swept across the Great Plains. Five hundred people, mostly immigrants and schoolchildren, were left dead; the catastrophe would forever cast a shadow on the promise of the American frontier. David Laskin tells the gripping story of the storm and its aftermath in the award-winning The Children's Blizzard.

Laskin examines the blizzard's impact on six pioneer families and their children, along with the U.S. Army Signal Corps officer who forecast the storm, and the tangled bureaucracy that made it so difficult to spread word to the people of the region. Written with remarkable insight and empathy, this is a masterful portrait of a tragic, unsung episode in the history of America's heartland.

David Laskin is the author of Partisans: Marriage, Politics, and Betrayal Among the New York Intellectuals and Braving the Elements: The Stormy History of American Weather. His writing has also appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Smithsonian. He lives in Seattle.

"Laskin pulls no punches ... The Children's Blizzard is a welcome contribution to the historical literature of American life and westward expansion." -- Chicago Sun-Times

--The Chicago Sun-Times

Synopsis

"David Laskin deploys historical fact of the finest grain to tell the story of a monstrous blizzard that caught the settlers of the Great Plains utterly by surprise. . . . This is a book best read with a fire roaring in the hearth and a blanket and box of tissues near at hand." -- Erik Larson, author of The Devil in the White City

"Heartbreaking. . . . This account of the 1888 blizzard reads like a thriller." -- Entertainment Weekly

The gripping true story of an epic prairie snowstorm that killed hundreds of newly arrived settlers and cast a shadow on the promise of the American frontier.

January 12, 1888, began as an unseasonably warm morning across Nebraska, the Dakotas, and Minnesota, the weather so mild that children walked to school without coats and gloves. But that afternoon, without warning, the atmosphere suddenly, violently changed. One moment the air was calm; the next the sky exploded in a raging chaos of horizontal snow and hurricane-force winds. Temperatures plunged as an unprecedented cold front ripped through the center of the continent.

By the next morning, some five hundred people lay dead on the drifted prairie, many of them children who had perished on their way home from country schools. In a few terrifying hours, the hopes of the pioneers had been blasted by the bitter realities of their harsh environment. Recent immigrants from Germany, Norway, Denmark, and the Ukraine learned that their free homestead was not a paradise but a hard, unforgiving place governed by natural forces they neither understood nor controlled.

With the storm as its dramatic, heartbreaking focal point, The Children's Blizzard captures this pivotal moment in American history by tracing the stories of five families who were forever changed that day. David Laskin has produced a masterful portrait of a tragic crucible in the settlement of the American heartland.

The P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.

Synopsis

Thousands of impoverished Northern European immigrants were promised that the prairie offered "land, freedom, and hope." The disastrous blizzard of 1888 revealed that their free homestead was not a paradise but a hard, unforgiving place governed by natural forces they neither understood nor controlled, and Americas heartland would never be the same.This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.

About the Author

David Laskin is the author of Partisans: Marriage, Politics, and Betrayal Among the New York Intellectuals and Braving the Elements: The Stormy History of American Weather. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Preservation, and Smithsonian. He lives in Seattle.

4.5 2

What Our Readers Are Saying

Share your thoughts on this title!
Average customer rating 4.5 (2 comments)

`
nancy , June 30, 2013 (view all comments by nancy)
A factual rendering of the massive crippling storm and loss of lives in the 1888 Blizzard of January 13th. As I read this book I couldn't help praying the settlers would keep their children home on this day. Intense reading which wouldn't allow you to put the book down for a moment. This is a must read for fans of history, and a well written true tale. Top rate-Five Stars

Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No

report this comment

`
Jenn , August 19, 2006 (view all comments by Jenn)
This is a very sad, but true account of children who died trying to get home from school during a blizzard. Read this one with a box of tissues nearby!

Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No

(8 of 13 readers found this comment helpful)
report this comment




Product Details

ISBN:
9780060520762
Binding:
Trade Paperback
Publication date:
10/01/2005
Publisher:
HARPERCOLLINS PUBLISHERS
Pages:
336
Height:
.80IN
Width:
5.34IN
Thickness:
.75
Series:
P.S.
Number of Units:
1
Illustration:
Yes
Copyright Year:
2005
UPC Code:
2800060520764
Author:
David Laskin
Author:
David Laskin
Subject:
Death
Subject:
World History-General
Subject:
Pioneers - Middle West
Subject:
Frontier and pioneer life -- Middle West.
Subject:
Children

Ships free on qualified orders.
Add to Cart
$7.95
List Price:$16.99
Used Trade Paperback
Ships in 1 to 3 days
Add to Wishlist
QtyStore
1Burnside
1Cedar Hills

More copies of this ISBN

  • New, Trade Paperback, $17.99

This title in other editions

  • Used, Book Club Hardcover, $9.95
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Instagram

  • Help
  • Guarantee
  • My Account
  • Careers
  • About Us
  • Security
  • Wish List
  • Partners
  • Contact Us
  • Shipping
  • Transparency ACT MRF
  • Sitemap
  • © 2023 POWELLS.COM Terms

{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##
{1}
##LOC[OK]## ##LOC[Cancel]##